Get composting
In partnership with Circular Homes, we’ve started a Bokashi composting programme alongside the regular composting scheme.
Bring us your kitchen waste, layered and fermented with Bokashi and we’ll use it to feed the soil. Read on to find out exactly how this works.
Overview
Bokashi is an odourless composting system that uses naturally fermented Bokashi bran to break down food waste and enrich the
It differs from regular composting in a number of critical ways: It’s incredibly quick – two weeks is all that’s needed for the organisms to do their work; it doesn’t attract rats and flies; and crucially, it composts all types of food waste, including meat scraps and cheese.
This last benefit aligns with the garden’s objectives in more ways than one – as it has the added benefit of ridding bins of food scraps. The sad reality of homelessness is
Fast Facts
Hassle Free
Easy, quick and clean
Suitable for all food scraps
You can include all types of food waste such as left-over meat scraps or cheese.
Pest Free
Unlike traditional composting of scraps, rats and other vermin are not attracted to the buried fermented product.
Stench Free
Because the system is kept sealed, there is no putrid or foul smell of decomposition to worry about, and it won’t attract flies.
100% Natural & Safe
It is completely natural and safe for you, your family, your pets and the environment.
Getting Started
As a Bokashi donor, your home composting process is hassle-free, pest-free, stench-free and 100% safe.
Here’s how to get going:
Buy a Bokashi starter kit
R250 will buy
700g Bokashi Bran
1 plastic bucket with lid, strainer and tap (25 litre)
Most households will want an extra bucket or two. We have extra buckets for R190 each.
If you need to buy Bokashi Bran, it is R170 for 2kg or R90 for 700g.
Throw your daily kitchen waste into the bucket
You can include all types of food waste such as left-over meat scraps or cheese. Just chop up any large bits of waste before adding them to the system.
Sprinkle some Bokashi bran on top
Put the lid back on the bucket
Drain Bokashi liquid once a week and dilute 1:300 with water and use as fertiliser on the soil. Do not spray directly on leaves or use on fynbos as it is too acidic. Can also use undiluted and pour down drains as a drain cleaner.
Bring us your full bucket
When the bucket is full, keep it closed for 2 weeks. It will go through a fermentation process and after 2 weeks, you can donate it to SWVG. Your bin will be emptied and returned to you to start the process again.
Fermented kitchen waste can be donated from:
Monday-Thursdays: 9:00-14:00.
Fridays: 9:00-12:00
(Closed on Public Holidays and rain permitting)
Giving back to Nature
The science behind Bokashi
While often referred to as a type of composting, Bokashi – a Japanese term meaning ‘fermented organic matter’ – is actually an anaerobic (excludes oxygen) fermentation process, which results in a very different end product than that produced via composting.
Oxygen-free = stench free = pest free
As an anaerobic fermentation process, air is excluded, with micro-organisms breaking down the constituents of the food waste until they are effectively “pickled”. During fermentation, it’s oxygen that causes the putrid smells. With the Bokashi system, the lack of oxygen and low acidity prevent the formation of organisms that produce gas and smells, and any already present will not be able to survive – they will be consumed by the anaerobic organisms that thrive when oxygen is absent.
Bokashi fermenting helps reduce greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide and methane, as well as bad smells like hydrogen sulphide and ammonia usually associated with scrap composting. It is also much, much faster than conventional composting – taking just two weeks for the organisms to do their work, rapidly converting waste into
Bokashi bran is the key player in this process; it’s a naturally fermented product made up of wheat bran, rice bran, purified and structured water, sugarcane blackstrap molasses, mineral rock salt and SCD Probiotics technology.
Once the fermented food waste is added to the soil, it breaks down completely and adds valuable nutrients to lawns and gardens. A healthy balance of microbes is also returned to the soil, re-establishing the required microbial counts present in good soil.
This method improves soil structure by increasing the soil’s ability to retain water and vital nutrients and antioxidants, resulting in vigorous and healthy plant growth. It also stabilises pH levels, suppresses plant disease, promotes earthworms and can even help break up clay-based soils.
